


Bloody Hands

by Onehelluvapilot



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: 5+1 Things, Angst, Arthur Pendragon Being Less of an Asshole, Blood, Blood Magic, Blood and Injury, Friendship, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, I mean the whole fic is about blood but its not really described in much detail?, Major Character Injury, Male Friendship, Merlin delivers a baby, Mild Blood, Mild Gore, Minor Character Death, Minor Injuries, Protective Knights (Merlin)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-06
Updated: 2020-08-06
Packaged: 2021-03-05 20:48:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,244
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25741585
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Onehelluvapilot/pseuds/Onehelluvapilot
Summary: 5 times Merlin had blood on his hands and one time everyone else did.
Relationships: Gaius & Merlin (Merlin), Gwaine & Merlin (Merlin), Knights of the Round Table & Merlin (Merlin), Lancelot & Merlin (Merlin), Leon & Merlin (Merlin), Merlin & Arthur Pendragon (Merlin)
Comments: 24
Kudos: 356





	Bloody Hands

“You trust me, right?” Gwaine asked, with his typical levity, but the look in his eyes showed that he was taking the matter seriously.

“Of course I do, what kind of stupid question is that?” Merlin replied, but his throat was tight and his voice full of pain and fear.

“Then let me see.” The knight held out his hand, palm up, and, after only a second’s hesitation, his friend carefully unfolded his own right hand from where it was cradled against his stomach and laid it in the offered palm. Gwaine forced himself to smile reassuringly instead of grimace. Merlin’s fingers were all black and blue where his hand had been stomped on by one of the townspeople fleeing the scene of the fight and there was a large scrape along the back of it and a cut on the palm that was bleeding sluggishly. Carefully not moving the appendage, he moved his head to look at it from several angles. Judging by the way Merlin smiled, he must’ve looked quite ridiculous as he did so. He didn’t mind looking silly, if it made his friend happy. 

“Well, I think we’ll have to amputate,” he joked and realized that was the wrong thing to say when Merlin’s eyes went wide. “Just kidding, just kidding. I don’t actually think anything is even broken. But hey, I’m not a physician, so let’s get you back to Gaius instead, yeah?” 

He helped Merlin to his feet and kept an arm slung around his waist as they walked towards the castle. Gaius bandaged the cuts and confirmed that the fingers weren’t broken.

“Can we tell Arthur that they are, so he doesn’t make me polish his armor?” the manservant asked.

“Mate, if he tries to make you do any chores tomorrow, I’ll break his fingers,” Gwaine replied, and Merlin smiled.

* * *

  
  


Both Arthur and Merlin looked down at the body. It had stopped twitching now and the only movement was the slow spreading of the pool of blood below him. He had been an assassin, that much was clear was from the knife in his own hands. The other knife, the steak knife for Arthur’s dinner, was held in Merlin’s shaking hands, which were covered with blood. The whole man was shaking, and his gaze didn’t move from looking at the man he had stabbed in the chest and killed.

“Merlin,” Arthur said, in his most princely tone, but the boy didn’t acknowledge him. He didn’t even seem to have heard. “Merlin, look at me,” he ordered, grabbing the servant by the shoulders and spinning him around. He barely avoided slashing himself with the knife still head rigidly outstretched in his hands. Carefully, he folded his hand over Merlin’s bloody one to unfold it gently and take the blade away, setting it on the table behind him. “You did nothing wrong. Let me repeat that. You. Did. Nothing. Wrong.” He emphasized each word, because this was Important. The pain of killing never faded, but the first time was always the worst. He wouldn’t have Merlin blaming himself or thinking he was a murderer for defending him.

Finally the servant looked up at him, pain in his eyes. Arthur said nothing, just squeezed his shoulder and hand where he still held them and maintained eye contact. The agony faded from his eyes and his face softened until it looked like he was about to cry.

“You saved my life, Merlin. Don’t ever be ashamed of that,” he said, and then there were tears welling up in the manservant’s eyes and Arthur quickly looked away. “Now, go tell Gaius what happened. We need his detective skills in figuring out who the man was.” He shoved Merlin towards the door. “Guards!” he shouted as soon as he was gone. There was a murderous feeling welling up in his chest and God help the poor soldiers who had let an assassin into his very chambers. For Merlin of all people to have to deal with him? What was security in Camelot coming to?

* * *

  
  


“Get out of here,” Leon said gently to Merlin, laying a hand on his shoulder and pushing him to leave the tent. “I know how to monitor his vitals, and if anything is wrong I will call for you.”

Merlin looked over to where Lancelot lay motionless in the gloom of the tent. He had passed out from the pain and blood loss while Merlin was dragging the crossbow bolt out of his stomach and stitching closed the layers of muscle damaged by it. Without the small healing spells he’d whispered under his breath throughout the process, which Leon politely pretended not to hear, the knight certainly would have died. He still might. The wound could become infected or he might simply succumb to the shock and blood loss. He was far too pale, skin resembling the bandages wrapped around his torso in color. The red blotches stood out starkly against the white.

“No, I need to stay,” Merlin objected.

“You’re clearly exhausted,” Leon protested. The field surgery had been an hour of terrible stress and Merlin was shaking. He looked almost like he was going to be sick and raised a hand to his mouth, only at the last second avoiding touching it and smearing blood over his face. “At least go wash up and eat something. You’re no use to him if you work yourself to death.”

Merlin finally nodded and let Leon shove him out of the tent. Arthur and all the rest of the knights in the clearing outside immediately got to their feet, expressions pinched in worry. None of them said anything but it was obvious they were awaiting news. And Merlin couldn’t give them any. Not good news, at least. He stumbled to the creek and washed his hands for just a moment before dunking his entire face in the water to try to hide the tears. Elyan was there not long later, sitting beside him but not doing anything, simply ensuring that he would be there to prevent the physician from drowning should he not come up for air within a reasonable time frame. Fortunately, he did. He began scrubbing the blood off his hands, much of which had dried. Behind him, he heard soft speaking. In the reflection in the water once it stilled, Merlin could see that Leon had peaked his head out of the tent to explain Lancelot’s condition to the others. When the knight retreated back inside, Arthur followed him in. To sit with Lancelot probably, in case he… In case he...

“Here,” Elyan offered, passing a scrap of cloth to Merlin. “To get under your fingernails.” The servant took it and the knight left, coming back a minute later with a bowl of soup. “Eat, once your hands are clean.” And Merlin offered him a weak smile and kept scrubbing.

* * *

  
  


“Well, where’s the midwife of the village?” Arthur asked the farmwife who was clearly beginning to go into labor. The surprise of the situation must have induced it.

“You just killed her!” she retorted. The prince looked over at the body of the old hag lying outside the cabin.

“But she was a witch!” The reports of suspicious crop failures had drawn the knights to the small village and when they had arrived, she’d attacked them with a tornado.

“Yes, well. She may kill crops but no women ever died with her in attendance,” the woman countered. Another contraction seemed to hit and she doubled over. Merlin darted forward to grab her arms to keep her on her feet.

“Well, I- um, have  _ some _ medicinal knowledge,” he admitted, and that was a mistake because the woman instantly latched onto him with a grip like a vice.

“You have to help, I’ll never manage alone.” She began to drag him into the house.

“Oh, then we can fetch another woman,” he said, but it was too late. They were already at the doorway. Merlin looked back at Arthur and mouthed  _ help me _ . The prince just smothered a laugh.

He wasn’t laughing later when screams were emanating from the cottage as he sat outside alongside the nervous husband on a bench across the street. The knights were off burying the witch, so it was just the two men waiting for whatever was going on inside to end. After another hour, the screams stopped. The husband got to his feet, and Arthur stood up beside him and lay a hand comfortingly on his shoulder until Merlin came out. There was blood on his hands and a dazed look on his face.

“Little girl,” he said, sounding stunned. A grin broke out on the man’s face and he rushed past Merlin inside to see his wife and new daughter. Arthur clapped his hands down on Merlin’s shoulders.

“You look like a man whose been to war,” Arthur said, a dumb grin on his face.

“I think I need to wash everything I’ve ever owned,” Merlin replied.

“C’mon, let’s find a river I can throw you into in the meantime.”

“No, I should stay with the mom and baby,” the makeshift midwife explained. “If you could fetch some water from the well, I think that would suffice in place of a river for now.” For once, the prince didn’t object to being ordered around and went to do as the servant asked. If Merlin could deliver a baby, he could at least get him water to wash the blood off his hands afterward.

* * *

  
  


“This is  _ wrong _ ,” Gaius said, watching as Merlin stretched the chicken out on a table, its neck hanging over a bowl. The old physician had half a mind to throw the boy out of his chambers rather than let him practice blood magic in there. Except he knew that Merlin would simply do it somewhere else, where he would be more likely to be caught and executed for it, and Gaius would not have his blood on his hands.

Looking at Merlin, it was clear that the boy agreed with his mentor. His hands were shaking and his expression was pained as he picked up the knife. “ _ Forgive me _ ,” he whispered as he slit the chicken’s throat, and looking at him, one couldn’t know which gods he was asking for clemency. The hen stopped moving beneath his hands and the sorcerer gently set her limp body down. “I have to,” he said, and it sounded like he was trying to convince himself as much as Gaius. “I can’t let Arthur die.” Dipping two fingers in the blood, he carefully copied a symbol from a scrap of paper he’d gotten gods-know-where. The book of magic Gaius had given him contained no blood magic or any other of the dark arts. He seemed rushed, working against the time constraint of the blood drying or Arthur dying, but took the time to double check the symbol after he finished before tossing the piece of paper into a crucible. Gaius couldn’t catch the words he chanted, given that he had never heard them before and they were in the Old Tongue, and at the same time he raised his hand and the paper burst into black flames. It fell into ash quickly and Merlin poured in water and a few more drops of fresh blood before pouring the whole concoction into a small glass bottle that his mentor brought over from him. As soon as it was stoppered, he rushed towards the door and presumably Arthur’s quarters.

“Merlin,” Gaius said, holding him at the door frame for a second. The boy wouldn’t turn around and look at him. “We are going to talk about this when you get back.” Without acknowledging that, he was gone.

* * *

Merlin wasn’t sure he had ever seen so much blood on someone who was still alive. Arthur stood before him, positively _ dripping _ . Granted, he didn’t think that much of it, if any, was his. He wiped his hands off, fairly ineffectually, on his trousers before kneeling down to cut the ropes where the kidnappers had tied his manservant up.

“Are you alright?” he asked, and if Merlin didn’t know better, he would have classified his tone of voice as frantic.

“Maybe a little roughed up, but yeah, I’m okay,” he reassured the prince. “Are you?” He still couldn’t wrap his head around how bloody he was. The knights weren’t much better when they arrived, weapons in their hands. Percival had red smeared over his face, Gwaine had splatters across his chest, Leon had streaks of it in his blond hair, and Elyan must’ve stepped in a puddle of it, for his boots were coated. Lancelot was nearly as covered as Arthur. His gloves especially, which he stripped off and discarded before reaching down to help Merlin, were drenched in blood.

“I’m sorry we could not get here sooner,” he apologized as he helped his friend to his feet. It had been two days since he had been abducted out of Camelot by some kidnappers who actually knew how much the manservant meant to the prince and that he would come to find him. Evidently, however, they didn’t realize just how much he was willing to do for him. How much violence he and his knights were willing to inflict. Merlin smiled, despite the bodies that lay all around him, as he realized just how loved he was by the men who would get their hands bloody for him.

  
  


**Author's Note:**

> I'd love to hear what you think of it!


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